I
recently saw “Battle of
the Sexes,” a movie about
tennis star Billie Jean King
beating self-proclaimed “male
chauvinist
pig”
Bobby Riggs in 1973.
I
didn’t
think
the movie was very
good,
but
that’s
not what I want to
talk about. I want,
instead, to point out
that the film speaks
specifically to the
#MeToo
campaign
and
the
slew
of
disgusting men who
have been exposed as such in
the past several weeks.
Riggs, who in an effort to
drum up publicity for the match
publicly made a series of overtly
misogynistic statements about
male
superiority,
functions
as a stand-in for all of those
men who have been defamed.
Except he never tried to hide
his sexism; there was never any
investigation necessary. It was
baldly out in the open.
Riggs — played by Steve
Carell, who, when on camera,
immediately evokes Michael
Scott and the 40-year-old virgin
such that I always am smirking
as I watch him — is portrayed
as a complete nut, stuffing his
gullet with a vitamin regimen,
alienating himself from his
family because of his addiction
to
gambling,
hijacking
a
Gamblers Anonymous meeting
by offering to play blackjack,
and,
as
mentioned
above,
publicly defaming King and
all women. And, finally, he is
soundly dominated by King in
the match of his dreams, which
he orchestrated.
Maybe
one
reason
the
movie’s power faltered was the
film’s ostensibly neutral take
on Riggs’s misogyny. The film
shrugs off Riggs’s comments,
at best as an effort to drum up
publicity for the tennis match,
or, at worst, as a product of
Riggs simply being his old, wily
self — “boys will be boys.”
Furthermore, despite the fact
that Riggs does lose in the end, I
left the movie theater knowing
instead that Riggs — the figure
of the overtly hateful man —
wins. I see Riggs in all the men
yet to be caught in response
to
the
public
testimonies
of
victims,
alongside
the
#MeToo campaign. I see Riggs
in Richard Spencer, a white
supremacist
political
leader
who might be allowed to come
to our campus. I see Riggs in
Roy Moore, accused of sexual
misconduct
and
rape
by
currently
eight
women
—
many of whom were
girls at the time of
these allegations —
whom our president
has
just
endorsed
in
his
senatorial
election. I see Riggs,
furthermore, in our
president himself.
We
might
take
the film’s title as a descriptor
for our contemporary moment.
This is a battle of gendered
power dynamics, where men
use women as coercible objects
meant to please their perverse,
selfish desires. Until we have
collectively
rooted
out
the
dynamics that allow for these
assaults to take place, we
have not done enough — the
Trumps, Moores and Riggses
of the world continue to win
the battle of the sexes. They
maintain
their
positions
of power, they continue to
capture mainstream cultural
attention, despite their publicly
understood
and
despicable
words and actions.
One potential problem with
movies like this one, which
fictionalizes
a
watershed
historical event of social and
political significance, is that
they risk restricting the event
and its implications to the past.
We look at the past from our
present squishy movie theater
chair,
eating
popcorn
and
pointing backward — look at
how things were. And look at
how different they are now.
This
dehistoricization
restricts the opportunity for
an honest engagement with
our own time, in terms of
the problems brought forth
by the films themselves. It
allows for complacency and
acceptance for the injustices of
our own time, for present-day
audiences to fall prey to the
illusion that human history is
naturally, intrinsically a story
of gradual, consistent increases
in egalitarianism and equality.
That could never happen today.
The movie itself does not
engage in this amnesiac logic,
nor does the film outwardly
resist it. This may have been
another reason it fell a bit flat:
It seemed not to engage larger
conversations beyond this one
exhibition tennis match.
The work of using this film
for
contemporary
cultural
purposes, then, falls on its
audience. I think we ought
to understand “Battle of the
Sexes” as an opportunity to
understand how far we haven’t
come.
To
understand
the
ways in which men like Bobby
Riggs have not lost that battle,
as the film’s dramatic final
scene would have its audiences
believe.
And
instead,
we
ought to interrogate the ways
in which Riggs and his kind
have remained staples of our
culture, navigating their ways
to positions of exponentially
more
power
and
prestige
than Riggs, whose greatest
accomplishments came as a
tennis champion, long before
the sport had accumulated the
international following it has
today.
This portrayal of overtly
misogynistic
public
figures
— as wily, unstable outcasts
without any social capital,
having
derailed
themselves
with their prejudice — risks
engaging the cultural amnesia
I outlined above. It allows us
to write off Riggs as a crazed
figure of the past who has
since disappeared, a name
most people would not even
recognize today. It allows us
to dismiss this problem as one
of the past, a product of our
ongoing,
consistent
march
toward a “more perfect union,”
to perpetuate a notion of
history that necessarily ends
in some realized promised
land, such that we equate the
past and all the events that
compose it with a less civilized
and just time than the one we
currently occupy.
Nobody
would
dismiss
Donald Trump, Roy Moore,
Harvey Weinstein, Louis C.K.,
Al Franken, Matt Lauer and
the rest as aberrations, last
remnants of a system long
faded. Which means Bobby
Riggs still exists today, with
the vital reinforcements of
maximal fame and power.
The battle of the sexes, then, is
ongoing. We must remember this.
W
hat does it mean to be
a good person? In a
world full of difficult
choices, I find myself grappling
with this question daily. Are
only those people who are truly
good, whose bravery and strict
moral codes have changed the
world, allowed to be called good
people? And is there a difference
between small acts of kindness
and big ones? The people who
donate to charity, who are polite
to strangers, who are aware of
how bad the world is but aren’t
able to or inclined to make any
drastic changes, can they still be
considered good people?
Having grown up in a religious
household, I was brought up
aware of the existence of evil. Evil,
as I was taught by my pastor and
my vacation Bible school classes,
was personified by the presence
of a devil, the cause of all things
bad in this world. I imagined the
devil as the stereotypical horned,
red man, carrying a trident and
having a devious look on his face.
Though I didn’t realize it at
the time, I had convinced myself
that evil could be spotted as a
silly-looking man wearing a cape
and that anyone who didn’t fit my
own, narrow interpretation of evil
could be trusted, or at least wasn’t
evil. As I grew up, my image of evil
grew to include more caricatures
— the creepy pedophile, the
violent racist, to name a few — but
my understanding of what evil is
did not.
A few things in my life made
me question my understanding
of evil. One was a World War
II and Holocaust class I took
in high school, where I learned
how the concept of “business as
usual” was used to normalize
the violence against Jews and
other
minorities
in
Europe.
Up until then, my concept of
evil had always been limited to
individuals — Hitler was evil,
Mussolini was evil; it was hard
for me to comprehend that an
entire population had somehow
been evil or had been complicit in
evil. My straightforward view on
evil was being challenged, and I
was struggling against it. I began
to question what it meant to be a
good person.
Two events have occurred
recently that I feel represent our
society’s inability to view evil in
a nuanced way. The first has been
the reaction to what has been
dubbed the “Weinstein Effect,”
i.e., the public downfall of various
men accused of serial sexual
harassment. After the downfall of
her friend Louis C.K., comedian
Sarah Silverman delivered a
monologue on her show “I Love
You, America” where she asked,
“Can you love someone who did
bad things?”
Second, The New York Times
published a profile on a Nazi
sympathizer titled “A Voice of
Hate in America’s Heartland,”
which was widely derided for
exhibiting sympathy for the said
Nazi. These two instances, though
widely different, I believe exhibit
a common theme in our morality:
our inability to normalize evil and
thus recognize evil that doesn’t fit
our standards or caricatures.
Sarah
Silverman,
albeit
unintentionally,
addressed
a
topic often brought up when a
famous or well-respected man
is accused of sexual assault: that
this man had a good reputation,
was a friend to many and because
of this, many cannot believe
that he committed such a crime.
Silverman handled this issue in
the best possible way she could
— she addressed her emotions
without denying the experiences
of the survivors. Oftentimes, it is
hard for friends and loved ones to
imagine that someone they care
about has hurt others. Men who
were kind, who were feminists,
who were kind to their daughters
couldn’t possibly be a part of the
problem, could they?
Likewise, the author of The
New York Times article, Richard
Fausset, seemed to be surprised
that Nazi sympathizers are,
in fact, human. He seemed to
express confusion that not every
one of their actions revolves
around terrorizing people of
color, that they are capable
of being polite, that they get
married, that they can cook
pasta, that they have friends.
He ended the article with no
deep conclusions, instead simply
describing a scene where his
subject and his subject’s then-
fiancé had a relaxing evening,
stating
“they
spoke
about
their future — about moving
to a bigger place, about their
honeymoon, about having kids.”
All these things may be true, but
what do we risk by humanizing
a Nazi-sympathizer? Someone
who expresses respect for Hitler,
who believes that races should
be kept separate?
This brings me back to my
original question: What does
it mean to be a good person?
Can a sexual predator or a
Nazi-sympathizer be a good
person? I’m going to be honest:
Considering I don’t even know
what it means to be a good person,
these questions are beyond me.
Any attempt on my end to answer
them will be disappointing.
Instead, I propose we think
about this concept in an entirely
different way and stop trying
to grapple with the cognitive
dissonance
of
realizing
that
someone who does something
that is objectively wrong can
also be capable of love and
kindness. I would argue that
considerate people sometimes
do evil things and participate in
evil movements. Their actions
are what we describe as evil,
even if these individuals don’t fit
our storybook, devil-with-horns
definition of evil.
In the end, our society has
built up moral codes for a reason;
we
have
determined
racism
is bad, sympathizing with the
leader of a genocide movement is
immoral, sexual assault is wrong.
I believe sometimes it is hard for
us to grasp just how complicated
fellow human beings can be, but I
propose we stop assuming people
who appear to be nice and kind
aren’t capable of terrible things.
Because,
overall,
being
a
good person doesn’t really mean
anything. It’s only a phrase
used by individuals, and what
makes a good person can vary
widely from person to person. It
couldn’t, and it shouldn’t, hold
up any type of evidence in a
public court of opinion.
Opinion
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
4 — Tuesday, December 12, 2017
REBECCA LERNER
Managing Editor
420 Maynard St.
Ann Arbor, MI 48109
tothedaily@michigandaily.com
Edited and managed by students at the University of Michigan since 1890.
EMMA KINERY
Editor in Chief
ANNA POLUMBO-LEVY
and REBECCA TARNOPOL
Editorial Page Editors
Unsigned editorials reflect the official position of the Daily’s Editorial Board.
All other signed articles and illustrations represent solely the views of their authors.
EDITORIAL BOARD MEMBERS
ELENA HUBBELL | COLUMN
Carolyn Ayaub
Megan Burns
Samantha Goldstein
Emily Huhman
Jeremy Kaplan
Sarah Khan
Max Lubell
Lucas Maiman
Madeline Nowicki
Anna Polumbo-Levy
Jason Rowland
Anu Roy-Chaudhury
Ali Safawi
Sarah Salman
Kevin Sweitzer
Rebecca Tarnopol
Stephanie Trierweiler
Ashley Zhang
Elena Hubbell can be reached at
elepearl@umich.edu.
The ongoing battle of the sexes
Isaiah Zeavin-Moss can be
reached at izeavinm@umich.edu.
ISAIAH ZEAVIN-MOSS | COLUMN
ISAIAH
ZEA
VIN-MOSS
How to spot a bad person
I
want to set aside for a
moment the question of
race-based
affirmative
action. There are legitimate
arguments for both sides of that
debate, and though I do have my
own opinion, it need not enter
this discussion of a second, more
pernicious form of affirmative
action: legacy preference.
My division of affirmative
action into two halves — race
and class — is somewhat self-
serving, I have to admit. Racial
affirmative action is an intricate
policy problem in which any good
solutions bring uncomfortable
financial concerns. On the other
hand, legacy preference might
be resolvable in an afternoon.
It seems like all universities
would have to do is publicly
announce they will no longer be
preferencing legacies.
I often hear the argument
that
legacy
preference
is
a
way of rewarding alumni and
encouraging
donations.
My
response has always been that
meritocracy is not a take-what-
you-will proposition; race and
legacy are both inheritances and
are thus distributed in an entirely
unmeritocratic
way.
Legacy
admits are also more likely to
have higher parental incomes —
at Duke University, for example,
the household income of legacy
students is, on average, $240,000
a year — which brings with it a
host of benefits in K-12 education
and nutrition. When seeking
meritocratic competition, there
are only so many head starts one
can get before the whole event
begins to look comically unjust.
The primary driver of debate
over racial affirmative action is
the question of what side makes
the process most “fair,” with fair
meaning that the most deserving
students get spots at universities.
I find it hard to believe that legacy
status enters this equation at all.
What academic ability does it
demonstrate?
What
personal
character does it showcase? What
historical barrier has it overcome?
Legacy status does not fit within a
framework for college admissions
that prioritizes students who
deserve the spots on the basis of
their own qualities.
One might respond that elite
schools — which are the focus of
most classic affirmative action
debates — are not moral actors
and don’t need to uphold some
cultural goal of meritocracy.
They don’t seek to do the most
good for the most people, they
seek to reward their customers.
Applicants whose parents are
perceived by the university as
more likely to donate, then,
can
actually
deserve
sports
the most. If this is the case,
though, universities cannot act
as fronts for opportunity, and
their customers — that’s us, at
the University of Michigan —
cannot pretend that our place is
earned any more than a product
is “earned” when one pays for it.
The
University
does
not
indicate the extent to which
legacy
preference
affects
consideration
of
student
applications, only that it does play
a role. Other universities, though
— even those who have made
public strides toward diversity —
give a rather dismal indication of
what the situation might be like
here. I haven’t found any publicly
available data on exactly how
much legacy affects applicants
to the University, however, so it’s
impossible to say with certainty.
It’s
important
that
legacy
preference
receives
proper
consideration in larger dialogues
about class here at the University.
It’s often discussed as just a minor
policy with minimal impact — one
aspect of a holistic application!
— which obscures the actual
consequences of the policy.
At Princeton University, for
example, an article written in 2010
seemed to make the correlation
between legacy status and an
applicant’s chance of admission
at the school from about 9 percent
to over 40 percent. Further
research indicates that the full
effect of legacy status fluctuates
depending on one’s SAT scores —
when in the 1250-1290 range, for
example, legacy provides a 13.6
percent boost; when in the 1400-
1440 range, it rises to more than
19.9 percent.
There
are
institutions
that
have
run
admissions
experiments
which
do
not
include legacy, thankfully. MIT
and Caltech, for example, have
ended legacy preference, and
though reputation is partially
up for subjective evaluation,
I’m not aware of any status
drop for either of these schools
or their students.
In
the
end,
either
elite
universities are pure businesses,
and can act in their self-
defined best interests, or they
are something different, and
should thus be compelled to
uphold a cultural expectation of
meritocracy. We cannot have it
both ways, though. If the most
capable students should attend
the best schools, then college
applicants cannot be arbitrarily
advantaged by class any more
than they can by race.
Legacy preference is a form
of affirmative action rooted in
class that extends privilege to the
already privileged. Its existence
both here at the University and
elsewhere
directly
impedes
efforts to “provide an uncommon
education for the common man,”
and should be ended immediately.
HANK MINOR | COLUMN
The other affirmative action
Hank Minor can be reached at
hminor@umich.edu.
JOE IOVINO | CONTACT JOE AT JIOVINO@UMICH.EDU
This page was made in loving memory of Marcia Renée Goodman.
An avid writer and reader, but more importantly a wonderful human.